Cannabis News Students for Sensible Drug Policy
  Truth and its Consequences
Posted by FoM on September 09, 2001 at 12:49:15 PT
By Michael Kranish 
Source: Boston Globe 

justice The roughly 10 million students who fill out financial aid forms this year will face a crucial - and some would say intrusive - question from the federal government: Have you ever been convicted of using illegal drugs?

If the student does not answer, or marks ''Yes'' - as more than 35,000 applicants have done already this year - the aid request is subject to automatic denial under a 1998 law that is being fully enforced for the first time.

Yet while supporters of the law say they only want to teach drug users a tough-love lesson, a growing chorus of critics says the law is flawed because it targets poorer students and makes no effort to deny aid to people who commit far more serious crimes unrelated to drugs.

''You can murder your grandmother and get financial aid, but you can't smoke a joint,'' said Eileen O'Leary, financial aid director at Stonehill College in Easton. ''You are denied aid even if you are convicted of a drug misdemeanor with no jail time. It is inequitable.''

Even the bill's sponsor, US Representative Mark Souder, an Indiana Republican, is not happy. ''It hasn't worked out at all the way I intended,'' Souder said in an interview. The law, he believed, would apply to those convicted of drug use while applying for or receiving the aid, rather than anyone who honestly acknowledged a past conviction.

''It would be unbelievable for me as an Evangelical Christian to believe that people can't repent and change in their lives,'' said Souder, blaming Education Department bureaucrats for misinterpreting the law.

Education Department officials say they are following the law as written. The wording is vague; the law says that financial aid shall be denied to ''a student who has been convicted'' of a drug crime, leaving government lawyers to interpret that as a prior conviction. In any case, department spokeswoman Lindsey Kozberg said, the administration is consulting with Souder about his ''legislative intent'' and she stressed that some applicants with drug convictions may still be eligible for aid depending on the severity of the offense and the amount of time that has passed since the conviction.

''We are here to put aid in the hands of eligible students,'' Kozberg says. ''The Department of Education is not the one that sets the eligibility criteria. That is the legislative branch.''

About 39 percent of college students get some form of federal financial aid, either through grants, low-interest loans, or a combination, totaling $60 billion in the 1999-2000 school year, according to the National Association of Student Financial Aid administrators. The Souder law does not affect financial aid offered by states, schools, or other nonfederal programs.

The issue has focused attention not only on how a vaguely written law can have unintended consequences, but also on how far Congress should delve into the lives of prospective students who have already paid whatever penalty has been mandated by the criminal justice system. The matter has become a cause celebre on campuses across the country, with a fast-growing group called Students for Sensible Drug Policy fighting against it.

The matter has attracted attention also because the law is being fought by a key part of the education establishment. The National Association of Student Aid Administrators has taken a strong stand against it, saying that thousands of prospective students who do not want to answer the drug question may be withholding their aid applications and perhaps not attend college.

Indeed, some educators say the law is hurting most the people it was designed to help - students from lower- and middle-income families that rely most heavily on aid - while having almost no effect on students from wealthy families who would neither apply nor qualify for financial aid. ''You could do nothing better for your citizen, especially the poor one, than let them get an education,'' says Stonehill's O`Leary, a leader in the effort to repeal the law.

In one typical case, William Braswell Jr., a senior honors student in computer science at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, was arrested in January and convicted of possession of about a gram of marijuana. After he informed the government of the conviction, his application for $3,000 in aid for this year was automatically denied in a government form letter.

''You reported a `2' in response to Item 35,'' the letter said, referring to his answer of ''yes''for a drug conviction. ''This indicates that you are ineligible for student aid.'' Braswell, who favors the legalization of marijuana, is now filing a correction based on the fact that a court eventually erased his conviction, so he still hopes to get his aid. ''I need the $3,000,'' he says. ''I'm broke.''

The controversy over the law highlights the broader question of whether government can help stop drug abuse through tougher penalties. Over the years, legislators have grappled with whether to throw every drug offender into prison or to focus more on prevention and rehabilitation.

Clearly, illegal drug use is widespread. The national Youth Risk Behavior Survey conducted in 1999 found that 27 percent of high school students had used marijuana in the prior 30 days, and 47 percent said they had smoked marijuana during their lifetime. (By comparison, 9.5 percent said they had used some form of cocaine during their lifetime.) The survey did not ask how many had been arrested and convicted. Other surveys show that drug use among teenagers has increased slightly in the last several years.

Financial aid administrators said they tried unsuccessfully to stop the law and now want it repealed.

''We believe that, first of all, if an individual has paid their dues to society as meted out by the justice system, they should not be denied the opportunity to better themselves through financial aid'' for college, said Larry Zaglaniczny, director of congressional relations of the National Association of Student Financial Aid administrators.

The problem with the Souder law became evident immediately after it was enacted. Last year, to the astonishment of Education Department officials, early returns showed that 20 percent of the people who applied for financial aid either said they had been convicted of a drug offense or they did not answer the question. Given that trend, 1.5 million people would have been denied aid, far more than anticipated.

After much investigation, including student focus groups, the department came to an embarrassing conclusion: The question was poorly written and many applicants thought they didn't have to answer it. This year, the department rewrote the question, adding, ''Do not leave this question blank.'' The new form says, ''Have you ever been convicted of possessing or selling illegal drugs?'' Now, nearly all applicants answer.

Still, about 35,000 applicants might be denied aid, either because they acknowledged a drug conviction (recent or otherwise) or left the question blank.

Souder, who is discussing with the Bush administration clarifying the law, blames a holdover from the Clinton administration for misconstruing his legislation. ''We don't buy that,'' responds Shawn Heller, a former Clinton administration White House intern who now is national director of Students for Sensible Drug Policy. ''If he never intended the law to do this, then he is still responsible for the tens of thousands of students who will be losing their aid who he doesn't even think should lose their aid.''

Souder stresses that his law does allow applicants to get aid after a specified period, typically a year or more, if they agree to enter a rehabilitation program and submit to unannounced drug testing. Opponents of the law say Congress has no right to add penalties to drug sentences beyond those imposed by the courts.

Michele Butcher of Southern Illinois University, in Carbondale, is one such opponent. Butcher says she was aware of the law but didn't think she would ever get caught with marijuana. Now, she is facing trial this week for misdemeanor possession of marijuana, and fears that if she is convicted, ''I'll be punished twice, once by the legal system and once through my career.'' She notes that her financial aid is in loans, not grants, and that she won't be able to attend school without the assistance.

A twist to this controversy is that it has highlighted the fact that the federal government has no database that would automatically verify whether an applicant has been convicted of a drug crime. Instead, the department performs spot checks with local law enforcement officials. While students with a drug conviction might be tempted to lie, that has its own risk. Lying on a federal aid application is grounds for automatic denial.

Some critics of the law, including the association of student aid administrators, say that Souder's efforts to fix it will not solve the problem. The push to repeal the measure is an especially hot topic in student newspapers and among student government associations.

''There is more interest on campuses in this than anything I can remember since Vietnam,'' says US Representative Barney Frank, the Newton Democrat who has sponsored legislation to repeal the law. He said the law was never voted on directly by the full House; Frank wasn't aware of it until a financial aid administrator mentioned it.

Souder, meanwhile, is frustrated that this controversy has overshadowed his overall goal of curtailing illegal drug use. He notes that critics of the drug war often complain that there is too much focus on penalties and not enough on prevention. But if more students were afraid of the impact of his law, he says, that would be a very large dose of prevention.

This story ran on page 1 of the Boston Globe on 9/9/2001.

Source: Boston Globe (MA)
Author: Michael Kranish
Published: September 9, 2001
Copyright: 2001 Globe Newspaper Company.
Contact: letter@globe.com
Website: http://www.boston.com/globe/

Related Articles & Web Site:

Students for Sensible Drug Policy
http://www.ssdp.org/

Drugs Trigger Withdrawal of Student Aid
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10733.shtml

Easing of Drug Rules Considered
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10639.shtml

Cannabis News Articles - SSDP
http://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=ssdp


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Comment #6 posted by mayan on September 10, 2001 at 17:34:22 PT
Piss off the Prez
Let the Prez know how you feel

http://www.justsayblow.com

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #5 posted by freedom fighter on September 10, 2001 at 10:30:37 PT
1.5 million people
hmm hmm

With nothing to do

but build the largest private army in the land of unfree, the homes of cowards

This could be the biggest blowback against the government.

ff

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #4 posted by greenfox on September 10, 2001 at 09:16:21 PT
Uncle Sam, in a jam
Uncle Sam, i killed my granny.....
I killed her with a fork in cold blood
I need some money, look at this act,
I need some help out of the mud

I need some money so I can learn
How to twist, lie and burn
And lookie here, a death by my hands!
Experience needed to rule the lands

But don't you worry, don't you fret
I stay away from drugs, you bet!
No coke, no pot, no lsd
So whatdayasay about that money?
And as I get it and laugh with gleeeeeee
I'll smoke a cigerette and drink brandy....

sig,fik,
-gf


[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #3 posted by dddd on September 09, 2001 at 14:26:51 PT
there is no
shortage of items to be outraged about in this WoDs sham,,
but this one really pisses me off bigtime...Souders law is
an outrage,,,and made even worse by the "That's not how
I meant the law to be interpreted" bull....I'm too pissed to
continue,,I would have to resort to excessive explitives,and
an offensively profane tirade ...dddd


[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #2 posted by E. Johnson on September 09, 2001 at 14:16:11 PT
The problem becomes clear: Souder is just an idiot
Souder, meanwhile, is frustrated that this controversy has overshadowed his overall goal of curtailing illegal drug
use. He notes that critics of the drug war often complain that there is too much focus on penalties and not enough
on prevention. But if more students were afraid of the impact of his law, he says, that would be a very large dose of prevention.

Does this man understand the difference between penalty and prevention?

He says there's too much foocus on penalties and not enough on prevention.

So he decides to spread fear among young people by making the penalties even more severe, and considers that an effective form of prevention?

Does this man ever listen to himself talk??????????

Does he know that words have meanings that he can't pick for himself while he is speaking them?



[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #1 posted by E. Johnson on September 09, 2001 at 14:09:16 PT
So he was in the bathroom when they voted on it?
Even the bill's sponsor, US Representative Mark Souder, an Indiana Republican, is not happy. ''It hasn't worked out at all the way I intended,'' Souder said in an interview

I thought that Republicans believed in personal responsibility.

So much for that myth.



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